At the movies with Vernor Rodgers

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The movie-viewing audience stayed away in droves for the opening weekend of “Sin City: A Dame to Kill For.” How bad was the box-office draw? Well, it pulled in only $900,000 more than “The Hundred-Foot Journey,” a nice little movie that will not pack the houses, and is in its third week of release.

This sobering box-office take could dampen enthusiasm for more movies based on Frank Miller’s graphic novels. The brain trust no doubt is grappling for answers as to why this film, written by Miller and co-directed by Miller and Robert Rodriguez and the second in a visually innovative screen adaptation, has fizzled.

There was a downgrade in the critical consensus, which was to be expected, given what the original “Sin City” delivered in style and wallop when it hit the screens nine years ago. What was astounding in 2005 is not going to generate as much of an impression in 2014. While “more of the same” can be a profitable blueprint in many movie series, “Sin City” seemed elevated above that. It set a new tone, and building on that is a tough task.

For the most part “A Dame to Kill For” scores above average. Its animated-live action mix, shot in black and white with selective color, again is a stunning presentation. The breakdowns in the film occur in the stories, character development and mood.

Noticeably absent in “A Dame to Kill For” is the macabre humor. Even some of the minor bad guy roles had their shining moments in the original — such as the sigh of resignation from the thug who gets an arrow through the head, shot by Miho (Devon Aoki). In “A Dame to Kill For,” villains are dispatched by the handful and not one of them stands out like that guy did.

On the plus side, fans of Marv (Mickey Rourke) will be happy because he is the most dominant character in “A Dame to Kill For.” This hulking creature with a hideous face who viciously hands out his own justice is back, offering viewers a look at some of his previous adventures before he put it all on the line in the original “Sin City” to avenge the death of the hooker Goldie (Jaime King).

“A Dame to Kill For” opens with a great sequence in which Marv, sitting in the aftermath of some terrible violence, now has to rely on his medication to help him remember what just happened. A quick review of the bloody action shows that Marv was administering his usual brutal justice, this time to college punks picking on the weak.

Marv then has vital supporting roles in two of the other stories in the film, coming to the aid of friends. Here it is not personal for Marv. He’s just helping his buddies, and enjoying every minute of it.

The rest of the movie has mixed results. Josh Brolin takes over for Clive Owen in the role of Dwight, and Brolin’s version is darker, more brooding, and not as colorful nor resourceful. While doing private detective work — gathering evidence of infidelity on the part of a successful businessman — Dwight gets a call from Ava (Eva Green), a woman who stole his heart and decimated it by dumping him and marrying a wealthy man. Against better judgment, Dwight meets with her and although she claims all she wants from him is forgiveness, he is not buying it. But darn it, he just cannot seem to resist Ava and is lured back into her life, rendered vulnerable by his passions.

Green has earned some critical acclaim for her work as Vanessa Ives in “Penny Dreadful,” and as tempting as it is to say she is dreadful in “A Dame to Kill For,” that is a bit extreme. But Green, who spends most of her screen time out of her clothes, gives a performance that is almost parody as she tries to portray a manipulative femme fatale. Some of her scenes are broadly over the top, and if this was the intention, it falls flat, making it hard to digest that her overt phoniness would work in getting men to do whatever she asks.

Luckily for Dwight, he has Marv, Gail (Rosario Dawson) and Miho (played here by Jamie Chung) for support and if it were not for them, he never would have survived to have his hilariously dark encounters later with dirty cop Jackie Boy (Benicio Del Toro).

The other two stories in “A Dame to Kill For” are the weak points in the movie. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays Johnny, a gambling wizard who takes on the powerful and corrupt Sen. Roark (Powers Boothe reprising his role) in a high-stakes poker game. He learns brutally that Roark is a poor loser. Battered, Johnny vows revenge but the promise of a nasty bit of getting even completely wimps out.

The other story centers around Nancy (Jessica Alba), the bar dancer who took on a new identity as she was a witness as a child to a crime that could bring Sen. Roark down. Nancy is not doing too well now that the police officer Hartigan (Bruce Willis), whom she loved, sacrificed himself so she could live on without fear of Roark tracking her down. She bitterly talks to the ghost of Hartigan, pouts, cuts short her dance routines, drinks and night after night cannot bring herself to shoot Roark even though he is in a neighboring room playing poker. She does wise up and drafts Marv to help her finally go after the sinister politician.

As with the original “Sin City,” each story will have its fans and detractors, but as a whole, “A Dame to Kill For” does not match its predecessor. Most ardent fans of “Sin City” will find things to like about this second entry, but if it weren’t for Marv and Gail, “A Dame to Kill For” would be a much weaker follow-up. As it is, unless it manages to hang in there at the box office and recoups costs in DVD/Blu-Ray releases, the “Sin City” franchise could end up like most of the bad guys in these movies — dead and gone.